Pages

Bi-racial Americans Traveling to Europe at Grave Risk of Profiling and Police Abuse

Mitch Henriquez came from a wealthy Dutch, Antillean island. He came to Europe not as a refugee fleeing oppression and war, but as a tourist. Nonetheless, Mr. Henriquez eventually had his trachea brutally crushed by a group of officers who would later claim that he became ill while en route to the police station. Video evidence eventually appeared contradicting police accounts, thereafter sparking nights of rioting not in the Christian/Antillean community in Rotterdam, but in the Muslim/Moroccan community in The Hague.

In a reversal of colonialist tradition that gave the lighter, "mulatto" members of European colonies more privileges than their purely African counterparts, light-skin individuals of African ancestry are today routinely confused for Muslims on the streets of Europe, and subsequently subjected to savage beatings and verbal abuse.

Hatred of Moroccans is basically ingrained in European culture, dating back to the centuries-long occupation of Southern Spain by North African people. Michael Gonzalez, a New Yorker of Afro-Puerto Rican descent, told Abreu Report that upon his landing in Spain and boarding a taxi, the driver began to warn him about the Moroccan menace.

"First he nervously inquired if I was Moroccan, asking quite bluntly. He became more relaxed when I informed him I was American, then told me to watch out for the Moroccans during my trip. My first conversation with a European person upon landing in Europe involved me being warned to watch out for people that look just like me," Mr. Gonzalez said.

Mr. Gonzalez spent three months traveling around Europe, and says an experience in Cordoba set the mood the first week of the trip: "I walked into a corner store to purchase some chips and the lady behind the counter immediately jumped up and very bluntly asked me what I wanted. I responded 'chips' and she quickly grabbed a bag from a nearby shelf and told me 'here!' She then put her hand out, and when I put the euro coin in her hand, she made a motion basically telling me that the transaction had been completed and she would feel more comfortable if I exited the premises. Everywhere I went in Southern Spain, I felt those side stares that people give when they're nervous about a person around them but are too afraid to look at the person directly, almost as if I was a rabid dog that would lunge at them."

Mr. Gonzalez did not meet anyone of Moroccan descent during his first week in Spain, all he heard was rumors of how dangerous they were, and all he knew was that people were afraid of him.

"The most embarrassing part for me took place in the Germany, however. I lost my wallet and went to report it. I fortunately have learned to keep my credit cards in one pocket, and my money in another pocket. I usually only carry my IDs in my wallet. I entered the police station in Mannheim and they immediately began to treat me like a criminal. They asked me how much money was in the wallet, and when I responded that the wallet had no money inside, the officer tried to subdue the contempt on his face, sternly saying, 'money is very useful.' That's when I knew that he was treating me as if I was some Moroccan person filing a false report."

Mr. Gonzalez was asked to leave his bag in the room where the officer was taking his report, supposedly to go talk to another officer. He claims the contents of the bag appeared to have been rummaged while he was out of the room. When he returned to the room, the officer handed him the statement for the lost wallet, and read to him the part about his legal status. The officer told Mr. Gonzales: "We don't have to know that," and impolitely threw the paper in his hands.

Many Moroccans, and increasingly people of mixed descent, fear that Europe is on the verge of a pogrom, and that the frenzy of a new Kristallnacht could lead the European masses to descend on the streets of the continent and begin shattering the skull of anyone non-white.